Marvell Ordered To Pay $1.17 Billion In Patent Case

Marvell Technology Group shares dropped more than 10% Wednesday after a federal jury ordered Marvell to pay $1.17 billion in damages in a patent infringement lawsuit brought by Carnegie Mellon University.

The damage award included a jury finding that the infringement was willful, which allows the trial judge to award triple damages.

The verdict was announced Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania in Pittsburgh.

The patents at issue involve technology to increase the accuracy with which hard-disk drive circuits read data from high-speed magnetic disks, Reuters reported.

Executives for Santa Clara, Calif.-based Marvell could not immediately be reached for comment.

The Pittsburgh-based university sued chipmaker Marvell over use of two patents, issued in 2001 and 2002, that cover ways to filter out noise and unwanted electrical signals when detecting data stored on a computer hard-disk drive, Bloomberg reported. The school alleged that at least nine types of Marvell's circuits used its inventions.

Marvell's stock is trading near a four-year low. It closed Wednesday at 7.40, down 10.3%, falling in the afternoon after the ruling was announced. The stock also was down nearly 1% in after-hours trading Wednesday.

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